Golf

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) -- Lee Westwood shot a 3-under 69 Friday to take a two-stroke lead after the second round of the Dubai World Championship, strengthening his chance of winning the European money title.

The English golfer could pick up two big prizes on Sunday. If he wins the last tournament of the European Tour season, he will receive $1.25 million in prize money -- plus a $1.5 million bonus for winning the Race to Dubai money prize.

Northern Ireland's Rory McIlroy, the leader of the money race going into the tournament, also shot a 69. He was one of six players tied for second place at 7 under, two shots behind Westwood.

The others are Ireland's Padraig Harrington, England's Ross McGowan, Australia's Robert Allenby, South Africa's Louis Oosthuizen and Colombia's Camilo Villegas.
Westwood is confident of winning both prizes.

RICHMOND, Texas (AP) -- Sophie Gustafson moved within two shots of leader Lorena Ochoa at the LPGA Tour Championship on Friday before second-round play was suspended because of bad weather.

Rain swamped the Houstonian Golf and Country Club before dawn and the start of the second round was pushed back six hours. The tournament resumed at 1 p.m., but light rain started falling about two hours later and play was halted for the day at 5:05 p.m. with darkness approaching.

Ochoa didn't play on Friday after shooting a 6-under 66 early Thursday. She will start her second round at daybreak Saturday.

RICHMOND, Texas (AP) -- Michelle Wie is gone, putting all the attention on Lorena Ochoa's player of the year fight with Jiyai Shin at the LPGA Tour Championship.

Wie withdrew from the season-ending event Thursday because of a sprained left ankle, hours after Ochoa shot a 6-under 66 to take a one-shot lead over Reilley Rankin.

The 20-year-old Wie, fresh off her first LPGA Tour victory last week at Ochoa's tournament in Mexico, shot a 72 in the afternoon. She limped through her round on the gimpy ankle that she sprained during the Solheim Cup in August, went for treatment afterward and withdrew about an hour later.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) -- Robert Allenby shot a 7-under 65 on Thursday for a one-shot lead after the first round of the Dubai World Championship, while Lee Westwood and Rory McIlroy kept up their battle for the European Tour money title.

Allenby, a 38-year-old Australian who plays mainly on the PGA tour, had eight birdies and only one bogey on the Earth Course, which is hosting the $7.5-million final event of the European Tour season.

Allenby was one shot ahead of England's Westwood, Chris Woods and Colombian Camilo Villegas, who all shot 6-under 66s.

The LPGA just outsourced its season.

Twenty-four events are on next year's incredibly shrinking LPGA schedule and 11 of them will be played on foreign soil, including the season opener in Thailand.

There also are tournaments in Singapore, France, Japan, England, Canada and Mexico.

One bonus: The U.S. Women's Open stays here.

Founded in 1950, the LPGA is the longest continuous-running professional women's sports organization in American history, but its future -- obituary? -- will be written in foreign dialect. Why? Because if selling women's golf in the land of the free and home of the NFL seemed difficult before, the LPGA hasn't seen nothing yet.

Rickie Fowler's dramatic play over the final month of the PGA Tour season makes him the player most likely to be watched through the offseason's qualifying progresses.

Fowler, 20, did not turn professional until late summer, but the former top-ranked amateur out of Oklahoma State, took advantage of three sponsor's exemptions to earn $571,090 in those three tries, a number that would have placed him No. 136 on the year's money list.

After finishing seventh and runner-up in his first two events, a strong performance at the Children's Miracle Network Classic could have put Fowler into an exclusive group of past players -- Tiger Woods is one of them -- to avoid qualifying school by finishing among the top 125 money winners as a non-member.

Tiger Woods won the Australian Masters Sunday, and for his troubles he got a see-through globe and a mustard yellow jacket. And unlike John Daly's appearance at the Australian Open last December, Woods made it through four rounds without having to smash anybody's camera.

Instead, he chucked his driver into the gallery after a poor tee shot during Saturday's round. Video indictment of his blatant disregard for human life after the jump.

Michelle Wie claimed her first LPGA tournament title Sunday, the Lorena Ochoa Invitational. To celebrate she did not mention a desire to be the first woman to play the Masters at Augusta National, did not unveil a plan to join the PGA Tour and did not ask for an exemption to the U.S. Open.

It's a start.

After a final-round 3-under 69 for a two-shot victory over Paula Creamer in Guadalajara, Mexico, Wie, 20, received a beer shower on the 18th green -- hey, just another college kid in Mexico. She then talked about the relief that came with the victory.

"For sure, it's definitely off my back," she said. "I think that hopefully life will be a lot better."

By all considerations, that will be entirely up to Wie.

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ST. ANDREWS, Scotland (AP) -- Tom Watson's place in the next five British Opens is safe after the Royal & Ancient's decision to change one of its exemption rules.

The 60-year-old five-time British Open champion finished runner-up this year but would have lost his exemption status because of the R&A's age rules. But golf's governing body outside the United States said Monday it has amended one of its rules so that former champions who finish in the top 10 in the previous five Opens get a five-year exemption.

That also applies to Greg Norman, a two-time champion who tied for third at the 2008 British Open.

GUADALAJARA, Mexico (AP) -- Michelle Wie, LPGA Tour champion.

Imagine that.